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Hogan trap out sequence

I'm starting a trap out from a five-foot diameter oak tree, hoping to use the Hogan method to get the queen.

Goals:
--get the queen and all (or nearly all) of the bees out
--rob out the honey
--seal up the cavity

My question is what to do once I have the queen in the trap. Options:

1. Close up the tunnel once the queen is in the trap, and move the queen and all trapped bees to a nearby empty hive. Place grass/branches in front of the entrance to trigger reorienting. Continue to move frames of bees at dusk from the trap to this new hive as the trapout progresses. When all bees are out of the tree, shake remaining bees from trap into the hive, and let the colony rob out the honey from the tree. Move bees all of apiece back to home apiary.

Problems: Likely flow of bees from new hive back to trap. Possible risk of the whole colony absconding back into the tree during rob-out period?

2. Move bees (including the queen) to home apiary in segments. Close up the tunnel once the queen is caught. When all bees are out, move the trap with remaining bees home, then bring out a different strong colony to rob out the tree.

Problems: Lots of moving bees. No vehicle access to home apiary makes moving bees a pain.

I like the elegant solution (#1) of keeping all the bees on site, letting them rob out their own honey, then bringing them home. Less disturbance of the bees, less hauling bees for me. Has anyone had luck doing this?

Re: Hogan trap out sequence

Here is what I would do. Just a suggestion.

It may be a pain as you stated, but, I would take starts as soon as I got 3 to 5 pounds of bees in the trap to a new location, at least a couple of miles away. I would do this by removing frames from the trap to a regular hive. Leave the trap in place. Check to see if you got the queen. If so, great, If not, either order a new queen and insert, or insert new eggs and let them make a queen. If you don't need/want the new hive, sell it, or combine it with another hive.

Reset the trap with brood comb and frame of unsealed brood, and as soon as you have 3-5 pounds of bees, repeat above. You may find that a good tree will yield 12 to 20 pounds of bees. If you don't want additional starts, you could consider selling them as a queenless nucs, or you can join with any other colony you have.

As each start is taken away, it weakens the feral colony. If it takes longer than 48 hours to get 3 to 5 pounds of bees in the trap, you have severly weakened it. At that point install/activate the funnel and when no more bees are coming out from the tree, close off the trap entrance and tunnel and then move the last bunch of bees, and let other feral bees rob out the honey from the tree, or seal up the entrance to keep another swarm from entering the tree and setting up house.

I have never left trapped bees in the immediate area, and my fear would be that they may want to go back to the original feral colony. I find that removing 3 to 5 pounds of bees, as they accumulate in the trap, hastens the demise of the feral colony. As bees are taken away there are fewer bees to gather pollen/nectar, and tend any capped brood. If you activate/install the funnel and let all the bees accumulate in the trap, you may find yourself having to place 3 or 4 chambers on the trap, before you get all the bees out. I have seen this, and it did work, and the complete trapout yielded 2 deeps and 2 shallows full of bees. By the time the tree was depleted, the trap had brood, pollen, and lots of honey in it.

Re: Hogan trap out sequence

I just built a Hogan trap and I have it set up on a tree now. I don't claim to know much about bees since I am only in my second season. I am lucky enough though to have Cleo Hogan as my mentor.

The bees are moving in and out of my box with no problem and I have some drawn comb in my trap hive. I've noticed some bees are staying on that comb. I haven't tried to lure the queen out yet. I'll probably install a frame of open brood in a few more days and see if I can tempt her into coming into the trap. Once I get the queen in the trap I'm going to place her and all the bees, with frames. into another hive body and start them out like you would a new split (giving them foundation and feeding). but I will leave the trap in place for a day or two more and catch as many of the straggler bees as I can. I don't think I'll try the robbing thing I would be afraid they would want to move back into the old hive. This is just my opinion which is worth about as much as a box of rocks. However if Cleo Hogan has time to answer this post he can tell you exactly what to do, and I'll be heeding his advice, also.

Re: Hogan trap out sequence

It took me a few minutes to figure out who Bill91143 is, but, I think I know now.

If this is Bill T. I would say your advise is worth more than a box of rocks. You did right well in making yourself a 5 frame nuc from one of my hives. (HA)

It is beginning to get late for trapping here in Central Kentucky. In a couple more weeks the queens will begin to cut back on laying eggs, and they will not be needing more room which you are providing her in the trap. Trapping for the queen is easier in early Spring when the queen is looking for any open cells to lay eggs. Later in the year, she has plenty of room, and then the only reason she will come into the trap, is the odor from the unsealed brood you gave her. If she doesn't need the room in the trap for eggs, she may go back into the tree, and the bees will likely use the trap to store Winter stores of honey. If this occurs, (starts storing honey in the trap), and if you want to eliminate the colony, activate/install the funnel and get all the bees out of the tree. If you were just wanting starts, or to get a queen, you might as well wait until next Spring. Let the colony build back up for Winter.

If you take a queen, this late in the season, you may very well leave the feral colony without a way to make themselves a queen, due to fewer viable eggs in the feral brood nest.

If you are going to try for the queen, check your trap often, so she doesn't stay in the trap for a few days before you check, and all the eggs in the tree gets capped, If you take the queen, and all the brood in the tree is capped, they cannot make themselves a queen. Then the tree colony dies. You will have eliminated your cash cow.

Re: Hogan trap out sequence

Thanks Cleo for the quick response. I think I will take your advice of taking bees home in 3-5 lb increments. Given the modest amount of bee traffic at the entrance and the fact that we are in peak flow here right now, I would be surprised if there is more than a single deep worth of bees. But we shall see.

I see that you recommend leaving the tunnel open and repeatedly baiting the trap until most of the bees are out. I will have to try that. Is there any advantage to keeping the tunnel open once the queen has been captured?

As for robbing, I might take a hive out there to do the robbing just because I'm interested to see what sort of honey is in there. If I did that it would be after I extract in late July/early August, during a relative dearth of nectar. Or I might just let the feral bees have it. Regardless I would like to get most of the honey out before sealing it up, as the landowner is very attached to the tree and I suspect that 50+ lbs of honey would accelerate rot inside the cavity.

Re: Hogan trap out sequence

Cleo, I just built a second trap and installed it on a Bedford stone house that has a hive of bees in the exterior wall between the stone and the framed wall. Do you have any suggestions for getting the bees out that differs from getting them out of a tree?
Thanks,
Bill T.

Re: Hogan trap out sequence

No real difference, but, normally houses are more difficult to seal all entrances. Probability of getting the queen is normally far less in a building due to the entrance(s) nor being near the brood nest. In buildings, bees may enter at a convenient point, then travel several feet, to build their colony between floor joists, or wall studs or rafters.

Re: Hogan trap out sequence

I'll keep this thread updated as the trapout progresses, as it is my first one.

Today, 36 hours after adding the box to the tunnel, the box was 70% full of bees, with the most on the frame with brood. No queen unfortunately, nor any fresh eggs, and they are starting to put nectar in the rest of the frames making the trap box into a storage area rather than a broodnest expansion. Not surprising as it is peak flow here - probably would have had better chances of getting the queen if I had started a month ago but I'm not giving up just yet. I'm planning to add another frame of brood next Monday and then a third one next Friday, with periodic checks for the queen until 6/24. If I don't have the queen by then I will activate the one-way exit and start drawing down the population in the tree.

Re: Hogan trap out sequence

When you say your hive is 70% full, how many bees are you talking about? I started my first trapout, about the same time as you. My trap has had brood in it for about 36 hours as of now. I just checked my box and I have only the one brood frame covered with bees. It is covered solid plus a few others hanging around in the box. Judging the size of a 3 pound package I would say I have about a pound and a half of bees in my box. I was wondering if I should go ahead and take these or wait a while longer. I think tomorrow I may go on and take the bees that are in there now and leave the brood there and see if in a couple of days I can catch another pound or so. I tried to call Cleo Hogan and ask if he thought I should take what bees I had then, but since I couldn't reach him I elected to give them another day before taking any bees. And like you, I haven't drawn the queen out yet.

Re: Hogan trap out sequence

Hi, If you will look on ebay you will see a trap I designed that appears to be a sure way to get the queen over and laying eggs in 5 to six days. While it would be wrong to guarantee 100 percent it sure works so well. I would say that something would have to make an exception that it did not work. This set up will allow you to get the queen and all bees over with just a few stages of trapping. It is listed on ebay as ultra nuc box.

Re: Hogan trap out sequence

Cleo, I have a new computer and don't have instructions you emailed to me last summer--could you send them again?

My co-worker's son found a bee tree (he is a future beekeeper and I think he wants me to set up a trap out for the fun of it. We want to leave the queen--I would use starts for a couple small hives, depending how strong the tree bees are.

I have the pre made trap out, and the red cone is in at this time. I still have a screen and tape on outer tunnel where I can easily apply to the tree, and it sounds like it's about 4-5 feet from the ground. I haven't seen it yet to determine if I will have a problem with other entrances.

I will know when to pull trap as to not depleat the tree bees too much?
Thanks, hope I'm not hijacking this thread...so sorry if I am.

Pleasant words are a honeycomb, sweet to the soul and healing to the bones. Prvb 16:24
March 2010; +/- 30 hives, TF

Re: Hogan trap out sequence

I have eight frames in the trap, all drawn and one with brood. The one with brood was 100% covered with bees, all of the other frames except the far outside one were about 30-60% covered, and the field bees were starting to store nectar in nearly all of the frames. I'm thinking to bring two more brood frames next week, which will give three brood frames in the box. Right now they are treating the trap as a honey super that just happens to have some brood in it. I'm thinking that with more brood they may begin to view it as a brood chamber and the queen might come out to lay. I'm not planning to take away any bees until I give up on getting the queen, as I'm thinking that crowded conditions will make the queen more likely to come out (though of course also more difficult to spot).

Interestingly, the hive is way more active now that I have added the trap. It is possible that they had all available space plugged out with honey in the tree and were not foraging intensely until I added the extra space.

Re: Hogan trap out sequence

Luterra... Looks like your bees have turned their attention from brood rearing to honey storage. That is beginning to happen here, and it gets more difficult to get good starts, or the queen, this time of year.

Re: Hogan trap out sequence

Cleo, I just did what we talked about last night. I took a junk queen that I intended to replace anyway, and installed her in a frame size cage and placed her in the bee trap. I hope the presence of a foreign queen will be enough to entice the queen into coming into the trap. Last night there was about a pound and a half of bees in the trap. This morning there are at least 3 pounds of bees. Tonight I will probably transfer those bees into a 5 frame nuc box. Even if I don't get many bees I'm having a ball trying to get the bees out. Reminds me of fishing or hunting. If what you are doing isn't working, then try something else!